


Don't Be Shy

by Scrunchles



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: AUs, M/M, Modern AU, awful aus, coffee shop AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-15
Updated: 2015-05-15
Packaged: 2018-03-30 18:00:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,300
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3946315
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Scrunchles/pseuds/Scrunchles
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Written for submitted AU #166 from awful-aus's tumblr: "I’m your waiter and I think you’re on a date but your shirt is on inside out and you’re super cute should I tell you about it AU."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Don't Be Shy

He was gorgeous, all tan skin and dark hair.  The only things light about him were his eyes and his smile.  Maker, his teeth were  _perfect_  when he smiled.  

During his first pass by the dark and handsome customer, Cullen noticed that his shirt was an unusually light color.  It was Spring, though, so it wasn’t unusual for the fashionably inclined to wear a splash of pastel or a washed out color.  It looked good against his skin, the color of his coffee now that he had added a dash of milk.

His second pass by the man’s table lead him to further believe that something was off about the shirt. The stitching was white and very visible, and he could see it clearly in a pattern that he associated with his own t-shirts being wrong side out, as they usually were when he collected them from the dryer.  Surely, though, this man who took such pains to upkeep his moustache and soul patch and the perfect way his hair tousled into place,  _surely_  he would have realized something so elementary as his shirt being wrong side out.

It took a third pass and the man’s date showing up to really convince Cullen that he was correct. Pale and barely visible on the outside of the back of the shirt was the label printed onto the fabric rather than a little white tag.  It had a brand that Cullen was unfamiliar with, but it sounded expensive.

The dark haired man was in animated conversation at his date, raving to her about his studies, from what Cullen could tell.  She was more interested in the giant cookie she had ordered, and kept referring to what he was talking about wryly as “sorcery” and “gobbledygook.”  Though, from her broad grins at his huffs of outrage and increased vigor of articulation, she only did it to get a rise out of him.

Cullen waited a while, trying to feel out an appropriate time to bring it up.  How would he even?

_Hello, sir, I know that you are probably on a date at the moment, but I just wanted to let you know you might have put your shirt on wrong side out._

He didn’t even know the man’s name.  He doubted that it was what his date kept calling him– “Vinty” or “Venti Cappuccino,” sometimes.  It explained his skin’s color and his accent, though.

Finally, his date stood and went to the restroom with a colorful, “gotta piss,” and Cullen swooped in.

“Can I get you a refill on your coffee?” he asked, and waited for that perfect smile and a jovial acquiescence before tipping the carafe to fill the man’s mug.  He then realized that he really had no plan to bring it up afterward and chewed on his cheek while the other man looked at him with those gorgeous gray eyes, looking so curious as to why he was still standing there.  “I… ah… just wanted to ask if you knew—is your shirt on wrong side out?” he asked, glad to finally feel the knot of worry in his stomach ease.  Now he didn’t have to worry about whether or not he should tell him.

“Hm…” the man hummed as he looked at the seams at his shoulders and down at the fabric clothing him. “Well, you’re not  _entirely_  wrong.”

_Uh-oh._   

“This is, technically, the ‘wrong’ side of the fabric,” he admitted, plucking at the cloth idly before looking up at Cullen and bringing that smile back.  “However, it’s made this way, all the seams are on the outside except for the side seams.”  He leaned to one side and stretched the shirt a bit to give Cullen a clear view.  

The side seams were, in fact, on the inside.  

“So it’s… fashion?” Cullen asked hesitantly.  He was a utilitarian dresser himself.  He had more plain t-shirts in his drawers than graphic t’s or button ups in his closet.  He just didn’t see the point.

“It is fashion, indeed.” The man nodded and it seemed a bit like he was reassuring a grade-schooler who finally achieved two-digit mathematics.

“Fashion.  Great.  Well, I’m done embarrassing myself now, it looks like your date is back, so I’ll… uhm… just be going.  Do let us know when you want your check and I’ll be happy to have someone take care of it for you.” Cullen felt like he was babbling and his neck was hot.  He quickly turned away, the patron’s laugh chasing him back behind the coffee bar.  He set the decanter back under the coffee machine before slipping through the door leading to the office and the break room in the back of the coffee shop.

“You alright, Chief?” Krem hopped off of one of the break room’s tables where he had been chatting up Harding.

“Yeah, I’m fine.  Stop wasting Harding’s break and go serve some customers,” Cullen told him, running a hand through his hair and hoping that he didn’t actually look  _that_  rattled.

Krem just grinned at Cullen’s clipped tone and saluted cheekily.  “Anything else, sir?”  Krem wasn’t above giving him an over exaggerated bow when he was being a hard ass, but Cullen was glad that he wasn’t doing so now.

“Yeah, let me know when the… uh… the guy with the moustache and the blonde girl leave,” Cullen told him, collapsing into a chair and crossing his arms.  “Don’t ask why and I’ll overlook you sitting on the tables  _again_.”

“Sure, Chief.”  Krem shot Lace a Harding a wink before grabbing his apron and leaving the room.

There was a long stretch of silence before Cullen finally noticed Lace looking at him with a grin.

“What?” he asked.

“Nothing, sir.  You were just flustered when you came in.” She was smiling and playing with her napkin, folding it into geometric shapes and then unfolding it and folding it again differently.

Cullen didn’t answer, preferring to sulk than explain himself.

Lace just kept on smiling, going back and forth between her phone and folding her napkin for the rest of her break.  

When she finally left, Cullen glanced at the clock and hoped that he wouldn’t be taking more than ten minutes.  With how the Teviner man and his date could talk, though, he might be waiting for an hour. Perhaps he should tuck his tail and emerge beforehand?

Just as the clock was edging into seven minutes, Krem breezed through the door and hopped up on the table Cullen was sitting at.  “So, Chief,” he said before Cullen could tell him to get off, “why was a hot ‘Vint leaving you his phone number?  Hm?” He held out a napkin to Cullen, black ink cut through the light brown of the unbleached paper to make up a short message in loopy, neat handwriting.

_Cullen—_

_She is not my date, but you could be._

_Dorian_

Below, a number was scrawled out in beautifully legible handwriting.  Then, at the very bottom corner was an unnaturally long postscript:

_P.S. It was exceedingly decent of you to attempt to correct my shirt “problem,” I do hope I wasn’t reading too much into that.  You can’t just_   _be a nice person, can you?  Feel free to text me the answer to that, don’t be shy._

“Huh.”

“The P.S. is longer than the actual message.”  Krem snickered and hopped off the table, leaving the napkin on the table in front of Cullen.  “Don’t be shy, Chief,” he said, slapping Cullen on the back before turning to leave the room.  “Us ‘Vints can’t be all bad, right?”

Cullen rolled his eyes at Krem’s back before rereading the note.  He chewed on the inside of his cheek before folding the napkin and tucking it in his back pocket.

After work.   _Maybe_.

**Author's Note:**

> Tevinter fashion, ammiright?


End file.
